Three Free Group Texting Apps for Your Smartphone

Google announced today the release of Disco, a group-texting app created for iOS by their in-house startup group Slide. They're allowed to operate independently within Google, which explains why they've gone for an iPhone app. To play fair, we've created this roundup of group texting apps for both iOS and Android, and one that works on any phone, smart or no.

These apps are all great ways to communicate with lots of people all at once, carry on long conversations, and set up events with invites, RSVPs and discussions.

Fast Society lets users message each other within the app, to save on text costs, using channels. Users can toggle push or SMS notifications, set up "teams" which can communicate by texting a single number, or set up conference calls.

Another in-app texting service, this one is good for longer message threads since it displays conversations with chatroom-style threading. Messages are free and unlimited. The only downside is that you have you use keywords to reply to messages, like old school SMS-based Twitter.

Designed to be as simple as possible, GroupMe assigns a number to a group selected from your contacts, which anyone in that group can text to, to reach everyone. Plain and simple. Be warned that on the iPhone it uses data, but on the Blackberry it counts toward the texting total. However it does work with any phone, even non-smartphones.

Do you use any of these apps? Do you know of any others? Share your opinions in the comments.